Light weight battery and battery tray trimming: DIY

[JP229]

Trying to figure out what to do about that big battery but dont want to relocate it to the back? Here is what I did. . .
I have recently swapped out my stock battery for the Yuasa YTX20HL-BS. The stock battery weighed 31LBS compared to the Yuasa weighing 15LBS

A Little about the battery:
12V
The CCA(cold cranking amps) on this battery are 310. There is a slightly more powerfull one made by Yuase that weighs 17lbs an still able to fit in tray sideways.
This one weighed 15 lbs, but some sites claim from 12-15lbs depending where you look.
I see some of these on ebay go for Buy It Now of $68
The battery was taken out of the back seat of a camaro that was covered in snow and had been sitting in 30 degree weather for a couple days and right away hooked up to my car and it fired up with no slower cranking than stock. We started and stopped the car several times with head lights, radio, and heat all on. A couple times with the door open and dome lights on as well. It never cranked any slower than normal.

Learn to adapt some habbits if you go with a similar battery!! If you are going to be sitting in your car without it running keep these things in mind. I always open and close the door after turning the key off if I am going to be sitting in the car so that way it shuts off all power.(i.e. moving forward in staging lanes). Also turn your lights off!
I have had a couple close calls where I let the radio play for about a half hour and the car cranked really slow when starting up.



Here is just a comparison between the two battery sizes.

First thing we did was cut the battery tray off to where it would fit the new battery.

I circled the bolts so you could see I was able to keep them in the factory spot so it screws back in normally. We were lucky to still be able to use the little battery stops in the same spot as well and hold the Yuasa in there a little better.

After cutting the tray, we drilled new holes in the tray for the strap and where the bolt screws in to tighten the strap down as you will see in the next three pics

We had to drill two holes in the car so the tray would sit ok.

Next thing we did was cut the battery terminals and drilled a hole in each terminal for a bolt and washer to screw into the Yuasa battery terminals

Here are a couple pics after finished and the battery being hooked up.

^^^Havent cleaned up all the extra wiring since I put the 2-step on so it kinda looks like a mess right now. If you need to get to your headers for any reason this makes it a ton easier now that you dont have to take the battery and tray out. Also, it may help extract a little heat and not have everything so cluttered up underneath the hood.

Underneath is a different car off google. You can compare how much more room you will have.

Another just to show the extra space^^Good glimpse directly at the headers right there too.


This may be a good idea to do as well; Take the battery out and set on a trickle charger over night.

I have not had any problems from winter months till a week ago coming back to the car after a few days to a week of letting it sit.
I put the msd 2-step on my car a couple weeks ago and after sitting maybe 4-5 days without being started, the battery was dead. I thought maybe it was a fluke the first time it was completely dead, but it also happened a couple days later just barely not having enough juice to turn the motor over.
The battery starts the car perfect when I am out and about in the car. I guess because it keeps recharging every time it starts back up. I'm thinking the recent problem has to do with the MSD module that I hooked up. . .

 

[Hatchman]

Nice write-up, thanks! Looks like a very simple and straight forward mod. I've never seen anyone post as a guest before, and it says your post count is zero, never seen that either. Register and stick around!

Greg H. did a similar mod and he'll probably post up with his experience. He has had good luck with his smaller battery as well.

Those smaller motorcycle type batteries do loose their charge a little quicker. I've figured out after owning several motorcycles for the past few decades that they'll loose about 1% of their charge per day on a good battery, even faster if it's been around a couple of years. Every time it is fully drained (dead) and recharged, it will loose it's charge faster and loose a tad bit of peak charge. In other words, they are little more fragile than car batteries, so keep them charged and they'll last longer and perform better.

For that task, I have three Battery Tenders that I usually leave the batteries hooked up to. I don't take the battery out to trickle charge it, I just hook it up in the car/bike or use the connector that comes with the units bolted to the battery terminal. Even for my optima, if I'm going to be gone for a week, I'll leave it on trickle charge, still hooked up in the car. Easy quick connection only takes a second to plug in.

Great mod, less wieght, and cheaper than most car batteries. Just can't run the radio while filling up with gas, which I hate it when people do that, and leave it cranked up while they go inside and pay for the gas or buy some scratch-offs.

 

[Greg Hazlett]

I have the Deka battery and so far so good, zero issues with it. I put a piece of particle board across the top of the plastic tray but did the same thing you did where I cut a slit in the strap to run the tie down bolt through it.

The car sat for a week while I was out of town, started on the first try last night so knock on wood it did not lose it's charge while sitting as long as it did.

 

[RMB427R]

Excellent write up and nice mod. I have the Odyssey in my 32 Ford and like the fact that it's a drycell and also really small. it's a bit more money, but here it is..

http://www.odysseybatteries.com/battery/pc925t.htm

Ron..